


Home I Came at Wintertide

by hoarous



Category: Mass Effect
Genre: AU, Alternate Continuity, Children, Gen, Grief, Minor Character Death, What-If
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-02-20
Updated: 2016-02-20
Packaged: 2018-05-22 00:23:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,263
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6063745
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hoarous/pseuds/hoarous
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>“Her coworkers identified her body,” the asari is saying. “There is no doubt. I'm sorry. Your daughter has survived, however--she's been in the custody of the Asari embassy, awaiting your recovery.”</i> </p><p><i>“My daughter?” says Charr, numbly.</i> </p><p>One lover lives, and the other dies. A what-if story about Charr and Ereba.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Originally for a kinkmeme prompt about an asari being raised by an alien father, but I haven't gotten that far yet l-laugh

For an immeasurable span of time, Charr’s world is pain and darkness: chaotic dreams filled with the stink of fire and acid and the screaming of alien young, interspersed with brief flashes of almost-consciousness. When he finally surfaces struggling and gasping into the light once more, he is almost astonished at the perfectly banal hospital setting. It is busy and crowded but otherwise perfectly ordinary. 

They keep him on a cocktail of drugs for some time after that--to hasten his recovery, and also to suppress his body’s own response to injury, the blood rage that would have any krogan tearing through the flimsy alien hospital like an errant incendiary round through so much dry tinder. It leaves him fuzzy-headed and incoherent, asleep more often than he is awake.

Gradually they taper down the sedatives. When he is judged capable of holding a conversation without tiring out, an unfamiliar asari, serious and somber-eyed, comes to speak with him. She tells him he was the only member of the scouting unit to survive the mission through the rachni relay, that Commander Shepard and Aralakh Company neutralized the rachni and brought him back. He has been recovering for two months. Then she hesitates. 

“I'm sorry, sir,” she says, “but I have some bad news for you.” She has delicate white markings around her eyes, like his Ereba; unlike Ereba, hers extend back in oblique hatching over the sweeping crests of her scalp. 

“What is it?” Charr prompts, when the asari doesn't continue. He expects it to be some complication with his recovery; prolonged exposure to rachni venom inhibits krogan regeneration and disrupts the chemical signals between redundant systems, and he is certain he was dripping in the noxious stuff by the time he lost consciousness on Uttuku. 

So when, instead, the asari tells him that the Citadel was attacked while he slept--that Ereba--

That Ereba was--

No. It couldn't be. Charr has survived, returned from the impossible; surely the universe couldn't possibly be so cruel, when he--

“Her coworkers identified her body,” the asari is saying. “There is no doubt. I'm sorry. Your daughter has survived, however--she's been in the custody of the Asari embassy, awaiting your recovery.”

“My daughter?” says Charr, numbly. 

The asari smiles gently. “Oh, I suppose--you would have been away on your mission when she was born. With long-range communications the way they are lately... well. There must have been no way to get the news of her birth to you.”

“Our daughter,” says Charr. “Oh, Ereba...”

\--

Space is at a premium in the hospital, and Charr is now half recovered; his bed is needed for other wounded, in worse condition than he.

“Take it easy for now,” says a salarian nurse. “Keep up your caloric and fluid intake, get lots of rest and limit strenuous activity--and definitely no combat. Best not to risk travel off-station yet, either. Talk to the out-processing desk to schedule a follow up in a month, and please do not hesitate to come back here, or to the Zakera clinic, if any complications arise before that.” The salarian makes a dissatisfied face. “Really, you still aren't quite recovered enough that we'd normally just let you walk out. We’re discharging you instead of transferring you mostly because space is so severely limited and you seem like a responsible sort. Not like the other krogan they brought in with you.”

“Other krogan?” asks Charr. “I thought I was the only survivor from my unit. Did someone else...?”

“Oh...” the salarian fidgets and blinks. “I'm sorry, no. You thought right. The leader of the krogan unit on the rescue mission also sustained heavy injuries--Urdnot Grunt. He broke himself out three days ago, the moment he was lucid enough to decide he was bored. Had to get collared by C-Sec and brought back.”

“I know of Urdnot Grunt,” says Charr. “Huh. He broke out of the hospital?”

“Yeah, out his bed and then out a window. Straight down, three floors! Tough fellow, that one, even for a young krogan.”

“He must be,” agrees Charr. “He killed a thresher maw on foot.”

“Is that what happened?” says the salarian. He tsks. “I thought it might be something like that, with the extensive venom burns. Dangerous, engaging one of those things in anything less than an armored tank. Lucky he was there to pull you out, eh?”

This nurse, Charr realizes after a moment of confusion, must not have had the security clearance to be told the true source of his injuries.

“Yeah,” he says finally. “Lucky.”

\--

After scheduling his follow-up, Charr asks directions to the asari embassy from the human woman at outprocessing. He gets turned around a few times and has to ask passersby to point him right--a suspicious and impatient salarian shopkeeper, a perfectly professional human in C-Sec light armor, an astonishingly friendly turian janitor. 

“Well, your people are out there keeping Palaven from being turned into a ball of slag by the Reapers,” says the turian, when Charr expresses his surprise. “It'd be pretty petty of me to be rude to you now, you know?”

So many things have changed while Charr was trapped down in the dark.

The Asari at the embassy desk pulls up his file immediately when he gives her his name. “Urdnot Charr--oh,” she says, and then, more gently: “Widower to Ereba T’Nixa, yes?”

_Widower_. His throat catches. “Yeah,” he manages. “I was told to--our daughter...”

“Your daughter is safe,” says the clerk. “She’s of a younger age group, which means she needs a level of care that our in-house facilities generally aren't prepared to provide, so she’s currently in the care of a provisional foster family on the Citadel. I can get you in contact with them and start the process to transfer custody. Would you like me to do that now?”

“I... yes,” says Charr, still off-balance. “Please.”

The asari begins typing furiously. “It may take some time,” she says. “The process for the transfer of custody of underage asari is designed first and foremost to protect them, so there are a lot of steps. For now--” her console chimes, interrupting her. “Oh. That's strange.”

Charr’s gut twists. “Is something wrong?” he asks. 

“No, no. Nothing’s wrong. You have preemptive approval.”

Charr relaxes marginally. “Because I'm... because I was the mother’s bond mate?”

The asari shakes her head. “No, even then there's a process. There aren't a lot of provisions in place for cases like this. An asari’s bondmate outliving her while their daughter is underage... it's very unusual. Or, well--it... used to be.” She bites her lip and enters a few more keystrokes. “Ah, I see. There’s... a Spectre override on your file.” The asari gives him a curious look. “A friend, perhaps?”

Charr shakes his head, bemused. “I don't really know any Spectres. The only thing I can think of is... I was evacuated from my last deployment by the Normandy. Maybe it was Commander Shepard.”

“Really? What's Shepard like?”

“I don't know,” says Charr. “I was unconscious the whole time.”

The asari’s hands flinch on her console. “I see. Your daughter is very fortunate that you made it back.”

Charr looks down. “...so, what now?”

“Well, now--” her console chimes again. “Huh, that was quick. The foster would like to meet with you at Apollo’s Cafe on the Presidium Commons.”


	2. Chapter 2

Charr spends several minutes nervously scanning the busy crowd at the cafe before registering that the Asari behind the bar is trying to get his attention.

“You! Hey you! Krogan! Dammit, are you deaf or just stubborn?”

“Sorry,” Charr says. He picks his way through the crowd and odd bits of rubble. A pair of C-Sec officers, human and turian, are having a quiet but intense argument over a sputtering and sparking display terminal right next to the bar. They don't pay Charr any mind, uniquely in his limited experience of C-Sec officers on the Presidium, so he tries to ignore them in turn as he shuffles past and slides into a seat across from the Asari.

“Hey kid,” she says. “Finally. My arms were getting tired from waving like an idiot. You Urdnot Charr?”

Her pleasantly gravelly voice is vaguely familiar. She looks to be fairly old by asari standards, maybe even matriarch-age, judging by the opacity of her skin and the curvature of her scalp. He can't really be sure, though, since her figure is partly hidden by...

... by...

“Yeah,” Charr croaks. “Is that...?”

There's a small bundle swaddled in cloth and strapped to her chest.

“Yep,” says the asari. “I'm Matriarch Aethyta, pleasure to meet you. This is your daughter Delphinida.” She strokes a hand, down and back up, over the lump nestled on her chest. “Big name for such a small kid. I take it you haven't had the chance to meet yet.”

“Delphinida,” Charr echoes. “It’s… pretty. Sounds good, strong. I like it. She’ll grow into it.”

“Didn't help pick yourself, huh?”

Charr shakes his head. “We knew we’d probably be apart for the birth, with the war. Ereba said… she said she had some ideas. I said I trusted her to pick something good. Something right.”

“Yeah? Well, you were right to trust her,” says Aethyta. “It's a good name. A bit traditional. A lot to live up to. You wanna hold her?”

“I--” Charr feels shy and clumsy, suddenly. “You don't think I would hurt her?”

Aethyta throws her head back and laughs. “Naw, kid, come on, she's a baby, not a paper Lucentide lantern. Here.” Aethyta reaches over the counter to position Charr’s unresisting hands, then reaches back to untie the harness before depositing the precious little bundle in Charr’s arms.

A fold of blanket falls back to reveal blinking amber eyes. A small mouth cracks open into a wide yawn before the baby--his daughter--shifts to mold herself against him, closing her eyes again, falling back into an easy slumber.

Charr is entranced.

“My own dad was a krogan,” Aethyta is saying. “Nowadays everyone thinks male krogan don't do baby stuff because you don't have it in you, but that's varrenshit. Product of the times, not biology. She'll be alright. Safer with you than just about anywhere else, I bet.”

Charr runs his thumb over the little ridges on Delphinida’s scalp, where the long sweeping tines of her crest will one day grow. Reluctantly, he looks back up at Aethyta, who is gazing at the two of them with a small smile on her face.

“Is anywhere really safe now?” he says. “Safe enough for...?” He trails off, not sure how to continue. For his daughter. For his family.

For what he has left of Ereba, for what he owes her memory to protect.

Aethyta’s smile vanishes.

“No. Probably not.” She looks around quickly. “Listen, Charr--this is my last day and I have a little over an hour before I can bail. You want to wait here until then and we can talk about it?”

“Yeah, okay,” says Charr. He thinks and realizes he doesn't have many options--he can't go back to the hospital, can't leave the Citadel, doesn't have his own place here. Maybe Aethyta can't help with that, but at the very least maybe she can give him some idea of where to start. “Thank you.”

“Right,” says Aethyta, before pouring a drink in brisk, businesslike motions and setting it in front of him with a solid _thunk_. “Here, for while you wait. On the house.” She turns away to see to the customers.

Charr examines the glass. It's not ryncol, fortunately--he needs his wits about him, such as they are, already his energy is flagging since leaving the hospital--but rather a dark Tuchankan ale. Charr carefully settles his daughter safe in his lap--the infant barely even stirs at the motion--and takes a sip of his ale. Not bad. 

He huddles in over Delphinida to wait.

\--

“Right, so, that's that,” says Aethyta, shrugging a battered leather jacket on over her work dress. Charr slides off his barstool, clutching Delphinida to his chest, to follow her. Aethyta pats him on the shoulder. “C’mon, babe, let's blow this shabby-ass travesty.”

“It’s been a pleasure working with you, Thyta,” calls out a human man from behind the counter. “You’re ever in the area again, you feel free to drop by, you hear me? You and your son-in-law both!”

“Yeah, yeah, ya sappy bastard. Try to keep your ass outta the fire while I'm gone, Samesh.”

“Hah! No promises, you crazy old crone!”

Charr waits until they're halfway to the transit terminal before asking, “Son in law?”

“Yeah, I've got no clue where he got the idea, but he seems to think Del is my granddaughter. So if you're the dad…”

“Huh,” says Charr.

“No real point in correcting him now.”

“I guess not,” says Charr, as they reach a cab. “Where are we going?”

“You got your own place on the Citadel?”

“No. I just got out of the hospital.”

“Back to mine, then.” She punches a destination and they get in the car. As the autopilot putters to life and floats them gently into the sky, Aethyta says, “I'll be honest with you, kiddo, there aren't a lot of options for stable housing on the Citadel if you don't already have somewhere. Hospital, prison, and refugee docks are just about it, and you just got out the hospital and the refugee docks aren't a good place for a baby this age. Not even gonna touch prison.”

“Oh,” says Charr, numbly. “I--”

“Which is why,” continues Aethyta, as if Charr hadn't spoken, “You and the sprog can both feel free to crash at my place as long as you need.”

“Oh,” Charr says again, when he's sure Aethyta is finished speaking. “Thank you. I don't know how I can repay--”

Aethyta flaps a hand dismissively. “Nahhh, don't bother. You can officially consider me to be helping you out as a favor to Shepard, and Goddess knows there's enough owed there to account for practically anything.”

“Shepard? Commander Shepard?” Charr feels even less enlightened. “Why would Commander Shepard ask a favor for me?”

Aethyta studies the lanes of traffic ahead, her mouth twisting in an odd expression. “My youngest daughter serves on the Normandy,” she says after a moment. “She told me the humans have a saying: save someone’s life, and that makes you responsible for them. Explains more’n a few things about the esteemed Commander, anyway.”

Charr looks down at his sleeping daughter.

After a moment, Aethyta says, “Hold on a sec.” She brings up her omnitool interface and quickly enters commands. Charr doesn't catch what she's doing, but there are some beeps and electronic chimes--some from the ‘tool, but most from the taxi--before she speaks again. “There we go. Now, how much did they tell you at the hospital about how you got outta that hellhole of a planet, anyway?”

“Not much,” says Charr. “The Normandy and Aralakh Company rescued me. I was... the only survivor from my team. Urdnot Grunt sustained heavy injuries.”

“Urdnot Grunt,” says Aethyta, “was the only other krogan who made it out of there at all.”

Charr considers the magnitude of this revelation. He'd known some of the members of Aralakh Company, by reputation if not personally--Urdnot Dagg, Urdnot Gurn, Nakmor Ularr, Jorgal Borh. Strong warriors all, some of the best the united clans had to offer. All krogan can fight, of course, but Charr was attached to the scouting team for his skills in equipment repair and vehicle maintenance, not combat or survival. If Dagg and Gurn didn't survive, then how is it possible that he, Charr, has?

“Figures, though,” Aethyta is saying. “They left out the juiciest part. Probably didn't even know, actually, it's classified as all shit.” She gives him a serious look and holds a finger up at him. “I'm telling you only because it concerns you personally. Don't go about blabbing it everywhere, alright? No intelligence leaks outta you.”

“I won't,” promises Charr.

“Good,” says Aethyta. She shifts to settle back in her seat. “You saw those rachni on Utukku. Notice anything weird about them?”

Charr closes his eyes, lets the memories of screaming insects and sputtering Firestorms wash over him. It's a courtesy, though, a silent respect paid to his dead comrades; he already knows what Aethyta means. “They were altered,” he says. “Part machine. Like those human Reaper things.”

“Like husks, yeah,” says Aethyta.

“So the Rachni were with the Reapers?”

“Well, they were and they weren't,” Aethyta says. “The Reapers captured the last Rachni Queen and took her eggs to make them into those things. That's what you all found down there. Some of the Reaper-rachni units have already been deployed--mostly on Tuchanka, a slim few spotted elsewhere--but, thanks to the work of your scouting team, Aralakh Company, and the Normandy, their supply has been cut off at the source.”

“The Queen is... dead?” asks Charr. He feels a sickly disquiet simmer in his gut. The rachni by themselves are one thing--a worthy enemy, a clean fight, a foe that brings honor in the overcoming. But what Aethyta is describing...

“No,” she says, quiet but charged with something, some emotion Charr is unable to name. “The Queen is _ours_. The Reapers imprisoned her and took her kids from her, turned them into these mindless shambling night-terrors. From what I hear, she’s pissed as all hell about it, and frankly, I don't blame her.”

Charr looks back down at his own sleeping child, cupping his hands over her tiny form. Reassuring himself. “I never would have thought--” he starts. Tries again. “I can't blame her either.”

“Anyway,” Aethyta says, subsiding from her prior intensity, “She's actually the real reason you got outta there, in the end. Shepard freed the Queen and they all bugged the hell out. Then the evac shuttle is getting ready to lift off, Shepard and Vakarian are trying to hustle a mostly-unconscious sub-adult krogan in there between the two of em--which, Grunt, he may be young, but boy, he ain't small--and the Queen just climbs out of the rubble and drops you at Shepard’s feet, neat as you like.”

Charr boggles. 

“I have a copy of the helmet cam footage,” says Aethyta, “she was actually real gentle about it. It's hard to guess how long it was between your unit getting wiped out and the cavalry arriving, but she must have had you for a while, too, so hell if I know how you were still alive. A prolonged Stasis, maybe. Anyway, then she uses your own mouth to say... something like, ‘this one’s still breathing, take care of him.’ I don't remember exactly. Wordier than that though, by a lot.”

“She used my what?” Charr asks, faintly.

“She can do this weird telepathy thing with corpses and unconscious people, apparently,” says Aethyta. “Can't actually talk on her own so she has to do that instead. Creepiest shit I ever saw. I can see if I can dig up the recording again if you wanna see what I mean.”

“No, I,” Charr shakes his head slowly. He's too exhausted to process all this properly. “I think I'm okay without it.”

“Yeah, I don't blame you, I'd say that too. Anyway, we’re here.” Charr only now notices that the taxi is parked, probably has been for some time, at the foot of a tall apartment building. “Let’s get you settled in.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ...and that's all I have so far. Planning on continuing eventually, just not sure when.


End file.
